"Are they idiots?" Eudoxia asked as the Khareeds thundered across the intervening terrain, the hooves of their great chargers throwing up a pall of dust. Phaedra shook her head. The Khareeds weren't idiots, but they were used to their way of war, the frontal charge of heavy cavalry, producing results. Those results had been good for close to a thousand years, dating back to when Atvari princes had carved their homeland out of the bloated corpse of decadent Urdesh. They were reckless though, spurred on by the notion of rescuing a princess and under the eyes of their Satrap to boot. A more logical response would have been to menace the Imperial troops without actually attacking, stalling their march so the remainder of their field army could move into position.

"Close enough," Phaedra agreed with her sub-commander. Imperial forces had their traditions too, but those traditions were borne out of desperation. Imperial armies tended to be bastard conglomerates of various semi-barbarians, they were almost invariabley outnumbered and survived only through discipline, cunning and using every advantage of tactics and terrain they could beg borrow or steel.

"Want us to feather them with arrows as they approach?" Eudoxia asked. Phaedra looked back over her shoulder, as though measuring the distance back to the coast, hundreds of leagues off.

"One volley, just before they hit the creekbed," she said after a moment.

"Its a long way back to Kestos and I think we are going to need our arrows before too long, its a shame we cant just..." she trailed off as an idea occured to her.

"Cant just what?" Eudoxia asked. Phaedra shook her head. It was something she would need to discuss with Brasidas, and anyway no one would have the option to do anything if they didn't pay attention in the next few seconds.

"One volley only, spread the word, then its blades and the Huntress take the hindmost."